Ronald Mathias Lockley (birth date|1903|11|8 - death date and age|2000|04|12|1903|11|8) was a Welsh naturalist and author who spent much of his later life in New Zealand. He wrote over fifty books, including "The Private Life of the Rabbit" (1965), which played an important role in the plot development of Richard Adams's "Watership Down".
Life and career
Lockley was born in Cardiff and grew up in the suburb of Whitchurch, where his mother ran a boarding school. While at school, he spent his weekends and summer holidays living rough in the woods and wetlands adjoining the old Glamorganshire Canal, an area now managed as a nature reserve.[ [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20000417/ai_n14301104 Obituary: R. M. Lockley | Independent, The (London) | Find Articles at BNET.com ] ] ]After leaving school, he worked with his sister on a poultry farm near St Mellons, but in 1927, with his first wife Doris, he took a 21-year lease of Skokholm, a small uninhabited island some four miles off the western tip of Pembrokeshire, which was inhabited only by rabbits and seabirds. After his initial plan to raise chinchilla rabbits failed, he began to study migratory birds, establishing the first British bird observatory there in 1933, and carrying out extensive research on breeding Manx Shearwaters, Atlantic Puffins and European Storm-petrels. He described his research in several books, including "Dream Island" (1930), "Island Days" (1934) and "I Know an Island" (1938). The work brought him to the notice of a wider circle of conservationists and naturalists, among them Peter Scott and Julian Huxley.He returned to farming on the mainland when Skokholm was used by the military during the Second World War. He then played a leading role in setting up the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park in 1952, and in mapping out the coastal footpath around the county. Living at Orielton, a large estate near Milford Haven, he undertook an intensive four-year scientific study of rabbit behaviour for the British Nature Conservancy during the 1950s. As chairman of the West Wales Field Society, he also led an unsuccessful campaign against the building of a large oil refinery at Milford Haven.His belief that successive British governments were not sufficiently aware of the threat to the landscape from industrial development led to his decision to emigrate to New Zealand in 1970, with his third wife. There he continued to write, mostly about islands and birds, but also novels, and to travel among the islands of Polynesia and in the Antarctic.[ He died in 2000, aged 96.]Bibliography
Books authored or coauthored by Lockley include:
* 1930: "Dream Island Days. A record of the simple life". Witherby: London.
* 1932: "The Island Dwellers". Putnam: New York.
* 1934: "Island Days. A sequel to Dream Island". Witherby: London.
* 1935: "Islands Round Britain". Collins: London.
* 1936: "Birds of the Green Belt and the Country around London". Witherby: London.
* 1938: "I Know an Island". George G. Harr
* 1939: "Early Morning Island - or a dish of sprats". George G. Harr
.)
* 1940: "A Pot of Smoke. Being the Life and Adventures of Dan Owain as Told to R.M. Lockley". George G. Harr
* 1942: "Shearwaters". J. M. Dent: London.
* 1943: "Inland Farm". Witherby: London.
* 1945: "Birds of the Sea". Penguin: London. (With R.B. Talbot Kelly).
* 1935: "Islands Round Britain". Collins: London.
* 1946: "The Island Farmers". Witherby: London.
* 1947: "Letters from Skokholm". J. M. Dent: London.
* 1947: "The Way To An Island". J. M. Dent: London.
* 1948: "The Cinnamon Bird". Staples Press: London. (Illustrated by Charles Tunnicliffe).
* 1948: "The Golden Year". Witherby: London.
* 1950: "The Charm of the Channel Islands". Evans Brothers: London.
* 1950: "Island of Skomer". Staples Press: London. (With John Buxton).
* 1951: "The Nature-lovers' Anthology".
* 1953: "Bird Ringing. The Art of Bird Study by Individual Marking". Crosby Lockwood & Son: London. (With Rosemary Russell).
* 1953: "Puffins". Dent: London.
* 1953: "Travels with A Tent in Western Europe". Odhams Press: London.
* 1954: "Gilbert White". (Great Naturalists series). Witherby: London.
* 1954: "The Seals and the Curragh. Introducing the Natural History of the Grey Seal of the North Atlantic". Dent: London.
* 1954: "Seabirds. An introduction to the natural history of the seabirds of the North Atlantic". (New Naturalist No.28). Collins: London. (With James Fisher).
* 1957: "Pembrokeshire". (Regional Books series). Robert Hale: London.
* 1958: "The Bird-lover's Bedside Book". Eyre & Spottiswoode: London.
* 1961: "Pan Book of Cage Birds". Pan Books: London.
* 1964: "Britain in Colour". Batsford: London.
* 1965: "The Private Life of the Rabbit". Andre Deutsch: London.
* 1966: "Grey Seal, Common Seal: an account of the life histories of British seals". Andre Deutsch: London.
* 1966: "Wales". Batsford: London.
* 1967: "Animal Navigation". Arthur Barker: London.
* 1968: "The Book of Bird Watching". Arthur Barker: London.
* 1969: "The Island". Andre Deutsch: London. ISBN 0233960902
* 1970: "Man Against Nature". Andre Deutsch: London. ISBN 0-233-95996-3
* 1970: "The Naturalist in Wales". David & Charles: Newton Abbot. ISBN 0715349007
* 1971: "A Traveller's Guide to the Channel Islands". Corgi: London. ISBN 0552086479
* 1974: "Ocean Wanderers. The migratory sea birds of the world". David & Charles: Newton Abbot. ISBN 0715357131
* 1974: "Seal Woman". Rex Collings: London. 1st American edition (1975, Simon & Schuster) ISBN 0878880879
* 1976: "A Biography of Gilbert White, Author of the Natural History of Selborne". White Lion: London. ISBN 0856861685
* 1977: "Orielton: The Human and Natural History of a Welsh Manor". 1998 edition by Transatlantic Arts: ISBN 0233969284
* 1979: "Myself When Young: the making of a naturalist". Andre Deutsch: London. ISBN 0233970916
* 1979: "Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises". David & Charles: Newton Abbot. ISBN 0715377310
* 1980: "The House Above the Sea". Longman Paul: New Zealand. ISBN 0582717763
* 1980: "New Zealand Endangered Species. Birds, Bats, Reptiles, Freshwater Fishes, Snails and Insects". Cassell New Zealand. (With Noel W. Cusa). ISBN 0-908-572-22-0
* 1982: "New Zealand's Birds: A Photographic Guide". Heinemann: New Zealand. (With Geoff Moon). ISBN 0868633925
* 1982: "Voyage through the Antarctic". Allen Lane. (With Richard Adams), ISBN 0713913967
* 1983: "The Flight of the Storm Petrel". David & Charles: Newton Abbot. ISBN 0715382195
* 1983: "Eric Hosking's Seabirds". Croom Helm: London. (With Eric Hosking). ISBN 0709912641
* 1987: "The Secrets of Natural New Zealand". Viking: Auckland. (With Betty Brownlie).
* 1991: "Birds and Islands. Travels in Wild Places". Victor Gollancz. ISBN 0854931961
References
